Read The Portable William Blake Online
Authors: William Blake
The Portable William Blake (45 page)
This is the Spectre of Man, the Holy Reasoning Power,
And in its Holiness is closed the Abomination of Desolation.
[BLAKE’S MOTTO]“I must Create a System or be enslav’d by another Man’s.
I will not Reason & Compare: my business is to Create.”
[THE EARTH]The Vegetative Universe opens like a flower from the Earth’s center
In which is Eternity. It expands in Stars to the Mundane Shell
And there it meets Eternity again, both within and without,
And the abstract Voids between the Stars are the Satanic Wheels.
There is the Cave, the Rock, the Tree, the Lake of Udan Adan,
The Forest and the Marsh and the Pits of bitumen deadly,
The Rocks of solid fire, the Ice valleys, the Plains
Of burning sand, the rivers, cataract & Lakes of Fire,
The Islands of the fiery Lakes, the Trees of Malice, Revenge
And black Anxiety, and the Cities of the Salamandrine men,
(But whatever is visible to the Generated Man
Is a Creation of mercy & love from the Satanic Void).
The land of darkness flamed, but no light & no repose:
The land of snows of trembling & of iron hail incessant:
The land of earthquakes, and the land of woven labyrinths:
The land of snares & traps & wheels & pit-falls & dire mills:
The Voids, the Solids, & the land of clouds & regions of waters
With their inhabitants, in the Twenty-seven Heavens beneath Beulah:
Self-righteousness conglomerating against the Divine Vision:
A Concave Earth wondrous, Chasmal, Abyssal, Incoherent,
Forming the Mundane Shell: above, beneath, on all sides surrounding
Golgonooza. Los walks round the walls night and day.
[THE TWO GATES]And Los beheld his Sons and he beheld his Daughters,
Every one a translucent Wonder, a Universe within,
Increasing inwards into length and breadth and heighth,
Starry & glorious; and they every one in their bright loins
Have a beautiful golden gate, which opens into the vegetative world;
And every one a gate of rubies & all sorts of precious stones
In their translucent hearts, which opens into the vegetative world;
And every one a gate of iron dreadful and wonderful
In their translucent heads, which opens into the vegetative world;
And every one has the three regions, Childhood, Manhood & Age;
But the gate of the tongue, the western gate, in them is clos’d,
Having a wall builded against it, and thereby the gates
Eastward & Southward & Northward are incircled with flaming fires.
And the North is Breadth, the South is Heighth & Depth,
The East is Inwards, & the West is Outwards every way.
[A VISION OF ALBION]In every Nation of the Earth, till the Twelve Sons of Albion
Enrooted into every nation, a mighty Polypus growing
From Albion over the whole Earth: such is my awful Vision.
I see the Four-fold Man, The Humanity in deadly sleep
And its fallen Emanation, The Spectre & its cruel Shadow.
I see the Past, Present & Future existing all at once
Before me. O Divine Spirit, sustain me on thy wings,
That I may awake Albion from his long & cold repose;
For Bacon & Newton, sheath’d in dismal steel, their terrors hang
Like iron scourges over Albion: Reasonings like vast Serpents
Infold around my limbs, bruising my minute articulations.
I turn my eyes to the Schools & Universities of Europe
And there behold the Loom of Locke, whose Woof rages dire,
Wash’d by the Water-wheels of Newton: black the cloth
In heavy wreathes folds over every Nation: cruel Works
Of many Wheels I view, wheel without wheel, with cogs tyrannic
Moving by compulsion each other, not as those in Eden, which.
Wheel within Wheel, in freedom revolve in harmony & peace.
[THE GROANING CREATION]Scotland pours out his Sons to labour at the Furnaces;
Wales gives his Daughters to the Looms; England, nursing Mothers
Gives to the Children of Albion & to the Children of Jerusalem.
From the blue Mundane Shell even to the Earth of Vegetation,
Throughout the whole Creation, which groans to be deliver’ d,
Albion groans in the deep slumbers of Death upon his Rock.
[MAN’S PILGRIMAGE]All things acted on Earth are seen in the bright Sculptures of
Los’s Halls, & every Age renews its powers from these Works
With every pathetic story possible to happen from Hate or
Wayward Love; & every sorrow & distress is carved here,
Every Affinity of Parents, Marriages & Friendships are here
In all their various combinations wrought with wondrous Art,
All that can happen to Man is his pilgrimage of seventy years.
[NEGATIONS ARE NOT CONTRARIES]“They know not why they love nor wherefore they sicken & die,
Calling that Holy Love which is Envy, Revenge & Cruelty,
Which separated the stars from the mountains, the mountains from Man
And left Man, a little grovelling Root outside of Himself.
Negations are not Contraries: Contraries mutually Exist; But Negations Exist Not. Exceptions & Objections & Unbeliefs
Exist not, nor shall they ever be Organized for ever & ever.
If thou separate from me, thou art a Negation, a meer
Reasoning & Derogation from me, an Objecting & Cruel Spite
And Malice & Envy; but my Emanation, Alas! will become
My Contrary. 0 thou Negation, I will continually compell
Thee to be invisible to any but whom I please, & when
And where & how I please, and never! never ! shalt thou be Organized
But as a distorted & reversed Reflexion in the Darkness
And in the Non Entity: nor shall that which is above
Ever descend into thee, but thou shalt be a Non Entity for ever;
And if any enter into thee, thou shalt be an Unquenchable Fire,
And he shall be a never dying Worm, mutually tormented by
Those that thou tormentest: a Hell & Despair for ever & ever.”
[THE OUTLINE OF IDENTITY]From every-one of the Four Regions of Human Majesty
There is an Outside spread Without & an Outside spread Within,
Beyond the Outline of Identity both ways, which meet in One,
An orbed Void of doubt, despair, hunger & thirst & sorrow.
[THE SORROWS OF ALBION]Hoarse turn’d the Starry Wheels rending a way in Albion’s Loins:
Beyond the Night of Beulah, In a dark & unknown Night:
Outstretch’d his Giant beauty on the ground in pain & tears:
His Children exil’d from his breast pass to and fro before him,
His birds are silent on his hills, flocks die beneath his branches,
His tents are fall’n, his trumpets and the sweet sound of his harp
Are silent on his clouded hills that belch forth storms & fire.
His milk of Cows & honey of Bees & fruit of golden harvest
Is gather’d in the scorching heat & in the driving rain.
Where once he sat, he weary walks in misery and pain,
His Giant beauty and perfection fallen into dust,
Till, from within his wither’d breast, grown narrow with his woes,
The corn is turn’d to thistles & the apples into poison,
The birds of song to murderous crows, his joys to bitter groans,
The voices of children in his tents to cries of helpless infants,
And self-exiled from the face of light & shine of morning.
In the dark world, a narrow house! he wanders up and down
Seeking for rest and finding none! and hidden far within,
His Eon weeping in the cold and desolated Earth.
[BABYLON AND JERUSALEM]O what is Life & what is Man? O what is Death? Wherefore
Are you, my Children, natives in the Grave to where I go?
Or are you born to feed the hungry ravenings of Destruction,
To be the sport of Accident, to waste in Wrath & Love a weary
Life, in brooding cares & anxious labours that prove but chaff?
O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, I have forsaken thy Courts,
Thy Pillars of ivory & gold, thy Curtains of silk & fine
Linen, thy Pavements of precious stones, thy Walls of pearl
And gold, thy Gates of Thanksgiving, thy Windows of Praise,
Thy Clouds of Blessing, thy Cherubims of Tender-mercy
Stretching their Wings sublime over the Little-ones of Albion!
O Human Imagination, O Divine Body I have Crucified, I have turned my back upon thee into the Wastes of Moral Law.
There Babylon is builded in the Waste, founded in Human desolation.
O Babylon, thy Watchman stands over thee in the night,
Thy severe Judge all the day long proves thee, O Babylon,
With provings of destruction, with giving thee thy heart’s desire;
But Albion is cast forth to the Potter, his Children to the Builders
To build Babylon because they have forsaken Jerusalem.
The Walls of Babylon are Souls of Men, her Gates the Groans
Of Nations, her Towers are the Miseries of once happy Families,
Her Streets are paved with Destruction, her Houses built with Death,
Her Palaces with Hell & the Grave, her Synagogues with Torments
Of ever-hardening Despair, squar’d & polish’d with cruel skill.
Yet thou wast lovely as the summer cloud upon my hills
When Jerusalem was thy heart’s desire, in times of youth & love.
Thy Sons came to Jerusalem with gifts; she sent them away
With blessings on their hands & on their feet, blessings of gold
And pearl & diamond: thy Daughters sang in her Courts.
They came up to Jerusalem: they walked before Albion:
In the Exchanges of London every Nation walk’d,
And London walk’d in every Nation, mutual in love & harmony.
Albion cover’d the whole Earth, England encompass’d the Nations,
Mutual each within other’s bosom in Visions of Regeneration.
Jerusalem cover’d the Atlantic Mountains & the Erythrean
From bright Japan & China to Hesperia, France & England.
Mount Zion lifted his head in every Nation under heaven,
And the Mount of Olives was beheld over the whole Earth.
The footsteps of the Lamb of God were there; but now no more,
No more shall I behold him....
[THE PRAYER OF LOS]And Los prayed and said, “0 Divine Saviour, arise
Upon the Mountains of Albion as in ancient time! Behold!
The Cities of Albion seek thy face: London groans in pain
From Hill to Hill, & the Thames laments along the Valleys:
The little Villages of Middlesex & Surrey hunger & thirst:
The Twenty-eight Cities of Albion stretch their hands to thee
Because of the Opressors of Albion in every City & Village.
They mock at the Labourer’s limbs: they mock at his starv’d Children:
They buy his Daughters that they may have power to sell his Sons:
They compell the Poor to live upon a crust of bread by soft mild arts:
They reduce the Man to want, then give with pomp & ceremony:
The praise of Jehovah is chaunted from lips of hunger & thirst....”
[THE MOCKERY OF MAN]“I am your Rational Power, O Albion, & that Human Form
You call Divine is but a Worm seventy inches long
That creeps forth in a night & is dried in the morning sun,
In fortuitous concourse of memorys accumulated & lost.
It plows the Earth in its own conceit, it overwhelms the Hills
Beneath its winding labyrinths, till a stone of the brook
Stops it in midst of its pride among its hills & rivers.
[WOMAN AND MAN]“I hear the screech of Childbirth loud pealing, & the groans
Of Death in Albion’s clouds dreadful utter’d over all the Earth.
What may Man be? who can tell! but what may Woman be
To have power over Man from Cradle to corruptible Grave?
There is a Throne in every Man, it is the Throne of God;
This, Woman has claim’d as her own, & Man is no more!
Albion is the Tabernacle of Vala & her Temple,
And not the Tabernacle & Temple of the Most High.
O Albion, why wilt thou Create a Female Will?
To hide the most evident God in a hidden covert, even
In the shadows of a Woman & a secluded Holy Place,
That we may pry after him as after a stolen treasure,
Hidden among the Dead & mured up from the paths of life....”
[THE PERCEPTIVE PATTERN]If Perceptive Organs vary, Objects of Perception seem to vary
:
:
If the Perceptive Organs close, their Objects seem to close also.
[THE WARS OF LIFE]“... Our wars are wars of life, & wounds of love
With intellectual spears, & long winged arrows of thought.
Mutual in one another’s love and wrath all renewing
We live as One Man; for contracting our infinite senses
We behold multitude, or expanding, we behold as one,
As One Man all the Universal Family, and that One Man.
We call Jesus the Christ; and he in us, and we in him
Live in perfect harmony in Eden, the land of life,
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